Maybe that is all we are
Modern day poets and writers
Amateur story tellers using different canvases
Lost souls trying to express themselves through ink
Broken hearts trying to cleanse themselves in blood
The stories are always made from the same elements, though
Pain, heartache, a little bit of hopelessness
Maybe a shred of light in the face of an abyss
And then it is all over.

Someday we will have DJs at funerals.
I should know. I DJ'd a wedding once.
Well I shan't say I DJ'd the wedding.
I merely pressed play on the tiny boom box (SONY) and here comes the bride.
Twas a beautiful wedding.
A black wedding.
The bride was my first cousin Tamara.
Yes the whole thing was beautiful.
Stop it already.

A scant 4 years later I attended her death.
A rainy morning.
A call.
Awoken early
the morning sun not up.

I have a photograph taken July 27, 2003 maybe!
My brother her sister and I on a Carribean cruise. I'm sticking a tongue out. I was mad at the fine Bahamian wearing fake dreads making money by posing for photos for the non-natives. But if you bypass my tongue in the photograph you can see her. You can see the foursome of us smiling with some random Bahamian fake dread.

If you look slightly left in the photograph you can see her smile.
Her smile.
Her joie de vivre.

A moment if you will allow me. Away from the boat the Bahamian boys would not leave her alone. They would whistle, catcall, stare and menace. But she was my family. She was my cousin. Her protector and her friend. Those boys' eyes would follow us. But when I held her hand down the boardwalk they did not dare come within punching distance.

I will refrain from her beauty.
Her elegance.
Her ability to tell me to 'shut the **** up' with only a glance.

Somewhere buried I have the video of her wedding.
I can't watch it anymore but perhaps I should.
I need to see her happy again.
Beautiful again and
looking forward.


United States

i
you say i am honestly not the same person
i say one day i woke up honest
and i do not know how to undo experience
my own eyes and ears and nose and mouth
cannot be undone at the moment
how do you do it?
push that pressure to the back of your mind
like that
how do you all manage to laugh with a straight face
at things that you know aren't really funny
i can't fathom it. where you go
when you are stomping and ripping
and ****** and jeering
and laughing and running
it's exhausting to watch you

ii
i apologize if it doesn't make sense
that i can't play along
but playing along
doesn't make sense
i could never win a grammy
with this tight lipped smile
laughing at the expense of others
makes me feel more like a paparazzi
placating insecurities for currency
leeching off the vulnerability
you may not think i'm smart but
i am smart enough to know this is not 'normal'
and there is nothing wrong with staring at you in the rearview
and saying "i wish that was really sarcasm"
i'll tell you the truth
and you don't have to like it
and you don't have to like me
and i don't have to like you
because if there's one thing i know about myself
it's that i don't dislike anybody
until they show off their callousness
hoping it's the right party trick
to gain respect

iii
we watch comedy tv, and you are worried
by the way my spine cracks
when i let out a uncontrollable laugh
dragging on, beginning to spill, and as i try to quell it
my whole body shakes with the pressure
of it bubbling inside of me
you feel all of this beside of me
a small volcano with a bent back
quaking absorbed by pillows and flowers and cushions
not quite right for you
wondering why i couldn't laugh like this earlier
when we were not alone
everyone is looking for something more porous
more willing to let in effortlessly
and absorb tirelessly
that can simply laugh like a stream bubbles
and let go of the undercurrent
yet we are sharp and uneven and course like logs
and the weight of our actions carries much further
being shunted downstream by tides of gravity
every intention runs it's course
every intention speaks volumes
if you feel that in your core
every day you will uncontrollably think of how
every intention defines the quality of the laughter
stuck in someone else's head
and you will save it for things that are funny

There are times
I miss holding babies,
touching the fleeting moments
of purity
and milk mouths.

There are times
I long for the womb,
to go back swimming
so I can be reborn
once more.

I am feeling ancient,
thousands of millenniums old
a speck of dust
carrying triple its weight
in my belly.

There are times,
my soul contracts,
breaking water almost,
becoming ready
for an arrival.

Tell me, how long
is the gestation of heartache?
How many embroys
must die before the soul wakes,
spitting an infant?

There are times
I miss tiny dimpled hands
a wink of a moment's reminder
of what was aborted
without my consent.

The cradle rocks
ever so gently in the corner
as my hands weave pink sweaters.
In the mist of the silky rain
I wait to give birth again.

v.k

See
Touch
Know

A beam of swirling light in the heart of the city
As families flee for their lives
Lightning, fire and explosions
Cars being flipped, debris everywhere
Lives taken just to be taken
Evil has consumed the city
And its flame seems ever burning

Love
Creation
Understanding

A shock to the corrupted nerves of the city
Goodness and virtue battle the tyranny
But are put in the ground
Left in the rain and forgotten
Why must there be good and evil?
It only causes pain
The division, the knowledge, the temptation and the fear

Holy rain fall on me
On these skid marked streets and grow a rose
Red as the blood we all hold
Push my whispered wishes toward your ear
They're full of desperation and curiosity
I trade you the morals, my honor and all I hold true
For all of this evil to be drained from my home
For without the darkness there’s is no need for light
And the ever spirit can rest and the world can flow as intended
So fly high red rose
Gather energy from the land and sea
Chant the sacred words and flush this place

Flashing implosion of energy silence the streets

The sun in the eyes of the saved
The children can sing once more
And we can all be as innocent as the children
May the sun forever shine

Guilt free and enlightened they give thanks
Their lives renewed and cleared
Praise the rain drop, praise the rose it has cultivated
Hold it high, in the highest power

They give their lives for the flower
The live their lives for the flower
They only know it to be the truth
For security they go to the perennial plant
But now their freedom belongs to it, instead of their own fears and temptations
Freedom taken
Dreams broken
All hope gone
The flower promised to delete all evil
But the flower itself is wicked
Draining lives and giving false hope to those in dread of the world and themselves
Ignorance is all I see
The love of being able to create something and understand it
The hate of being unable to destroy everything you don’t understand
Cry life!
Look at today you’ll soon know
With out the darkness we wouldn't need light to see
Without the light there would be no darkness to hide what must be seen
Without both there is nothing to see
The universe over my head
I see Life grows, flows and goes
Good or bad it pushes through
The pre-approved righteousness should not be your guiding light
Neither should hand-me-down precedents of malevolence  
You yourself must chose your own path for it is your choice and yours alone
And that is what life is about
The choices we make cause the earth to spin and balance perfectly
Do not let anyone or anything dictate your life or the decisions you make

Anxiety is not
Only sweaty palms and racing thoughts

It's thoughts and thoughts and thoughts and thoughts and thoughts and oh my god I need to stop but I can't because if I do what if my world stops too?

Anxiety is not
Finishing things
Because there are things and things and things and things and
That need to be done and you can't just stop at one.

Anxiety is depression's friend
The friend that springs you out of bed fifteen minutes before your alarm, wrenching you from depression's arms and shattering your sadness.
But upon impact with the floor,
Your feet are cemented down and your goals are just out of reach because god you have the will power and you swear you're trying but why can't you be perfect and perfect and perfect and perfect.

Anxiety is the feeling
That pushes and pushes and pushes and pushes and pushes
Until it pushes you over the cliff
And you land amongst the lives anxiety has claimed that litter the bottom of the canyon that surrounds you and stops you from achieving what you wanted because god forbid you're actually trying.

When I called the visual appeal of your body topography, you laughed. You misunderstood.
The sharp angles, the planes, the curves and the hollows of your body, of your skin stretched thin over bone, these are what I find beautiful. This is the topography of you, the places I want to map with my lips and teeth. The familiar places, my home within a home, my love.
Your body is geometry, trigonometry, mathematics you hate almost as much as the way I can trace your every rib and vertebrae. Perspective translates your flaws into aesthetic beauty, but your perspective is your own and you will never see what I do. I will love you enough for the both of us, darling, love your flaws more than your perfection just to give you what you deserve.

red dress in the closet
shots, shots, shots
best friends
shots, shots, shots,
attractions
tension
shut down
shut down
shut down
boys cry?
failure
used till emotionally exhausted
kissing against the closet
life planned out on notebook paper
pressure
shots, shots, shots
tears
squats and drops and swim and swim and swim
silent screams
pack up & move
disqualification
I told you I was trying my hardest
imprisoned in my own body
25 extra lbs.
gasping
rushing
only silence when everyone sleeps
5.8% my ***
failure
failure
fat ***
business minor
screams
breathes in nothing but fear
disappointment kicks into gear
holidays come
two weeks